*I will be using PC here, so just change all Ctrl to Command and Alt to Option if your using a mac.

Final Preview

Part 1

Open the “base-image_by-camille-cordero.jpg” image and name this layer “Base Image”.

Part 2: Body Painting

Create a new layer (Shift Ctrl+N) and name it “Body Paint”. Set the Layer Blend Mode to “Multiply”

We are going to start off by using a brush to paint the face and the left arm of the base image.

First select the brush tool and choose a soft rounded brush. Make the size according to your preference.

After that change the foreground color to #fff200.

Now we are ready to paint. Start off with the face and the neck first. In this step feel free to zoom in and zoom out and change the brush size according to your needs.

Note: Keyboard shortcuts are very handy in this step. The keyboard shortcut for zooming in is Ctrl+ and zooming out is Ctrl -. To change the brush size, you can use right bracket sign “]” to increase your brush size and left bracket sign “[“ to make it smaller.

Now we are going to do the left arm but first change the foreground color to “#ec008c”

Choose the Pen tool and trace around her arm.

After you are done tracing, press Ctrl+Enter, this will make a selection. The blinking dashed-lines (marching ants)
will appear.

From the menu bar, choose Select>Modify>Feather and choose 0.5, then click OK. (if your using CS3 click Ctrl+Alt+D to show feather option.)

Now choose the paint bucket tool (G) and click on the selected area then press Ctrl+D to deselect.

Part 3: Adding the Paint Toss

Now lets get wet and toss her the paints! (Please remember this part since we will use this technique in the succeeding part).

Open number nine paint toss from the media militia paint tossing pack. Drag this to you working document. Use the magic wand to select the black in this image. Press delete to remove the background.

Press CTRL+D to deselect the selection. Name this layer “face toss” and position the orientation of the paint (ctrl+T) like shown below:

Now we will blend this paint to the color of her face.
a. first select the eyedropper tool (I).
b. then click the area of the face shown below:

Create a new layer (shift+ctrl+N) and name it “face toss color”, check the “use previous layer to create clipping mask” and change the blending mode to “color”.

Now while your still in the “face toss color” layer, use the paint bucket tool (g) and click it into the artboard to recolor the paint toss so we can match it on the color of the face.

Now, we will erase some parts to complete the blending of the paint to its face.

Go to the “face toss” layer, then click the “add vector mask icon”, then change your foreground color to “black”.

Then using a soft brush tool, (while the vector mask is selected) paint over the area you want to erase, to achieve similar result like the one below:

Now, with the same process, do this on the left arm using the file “paint toss no.16“

Now use the “paint toss no.7“ for the clothes. we need to adjust the brightness of the paint for about -92 to blend in with the clothes (Image>adjustment>Brightness/Contrast).

Lets add some flat black paint toss in the part of the hair. I used “paint toss no.9“

Then go to Layer>Layer Style>Color Overlay then choose the color “Black”.

Erase some parts, using vector mask or simply use the Eraser tool. I just preferred erasing parts using vector mask so I can revert in back at anytime.

So here is the result so far:

Part 4: Adding Shape Cut-Outs

Now let’s add some shape cut-outs. To do this we must first select all the layers, duplicate them, then merge them into one.

Go to Custom Shape tool and select the outlined triangle shown below:

Then while holding shift, create a triangle, you can move your triangle
by using “path selection tool (A). Feel free to position your triangle wherever you want.

Then press Ctrl+Enter , then press Ctrl+j to duplicate, then move it to the right, then press Ctrl+D to deselect.

Do another triangle from the merged layer using the same steps and overlap it to the first triangle.

Then lets interlocked the two triangles, first while holding ctrl key, click the left triangle, a marching ant should appear. then go to Select>modify>expand then set it to 15px. then you should have a result similar below:

After that, select the right triangle layer, using the eraser tool, erase the part shown below:
Using the same technique, do this again, but you will start on the right triangle, then vice versa.

So here is what we have so far:

To finish things up, I just add some additional shapes using the same technique:

Yeah! Its finished! Go get your self a reward! (well if you want to add more its up to you). Hope you enjoy this tutorial, if there’s any question or any part which is not clear , just leave a message in the comments section and I will try to answer it.

Love this tutorial and easy to follow! Im stuck and cant seam to figre out what im doing wrong. ive copied and grouped the layers but when i place the triangle shape and copy it, it doesnt copy the image within the shape. any help would be great. im a working with cs4 and dont know if maybe thats part of the problem. thanks for the great tutorial!

i downloaded the paint toss effects and opened them with photoshop but when i select then try to deselect it says “could not complete your request as the image is not directly editable, can someone help, it would be fully appreciated.

Hello
thks for this amazing tutorial! I’ve tried it once and succeeded!
but, i’m trying again and find difficulties on the triangle part and the Custom Shape tool (step4). As I want to make the seletion with the triangle (or any other shape like the puzzle for example), this is not translucid but colored with the foreground color. HELP !!!!!!!!

amazing tutorial! however, I can’t seem to copy the image with the triangle. All it does is make another see through triangle. I copied all of the layers and merged them into one, so now I have all of the layers with the duplicated/merged one on top. What should I do?

I don’t get the part with the vector mask…
I went to face toss & pressed vector layer & took a soft brush & my foreground color was black.. But…
once it got white
once it got black
& sometimes it nothing happened.

You need to make sure that after you create the mask and select the brush tool that:
a) your foreground color is set to black
b) you click on the vector mask so you are painting the mask
c) that you use the brush to paint away the paint splatter where you want the skin to show through.

Hope that helps Sarah. Thanks for reading the tutorial and using it! Good Luck!!

But… I get stuck on the triangle part. (just like a few guys mentioned above).

After I duplicated all layers, placed them in a group and merged them, I use the Custom Shape Tool. I create it while holding shift…. but all I see is the traingle coloured in my foreground color. When I press Ctrl+Enter and then press Ctrl+j … nothing happens.

Thanx a lot Heinritzh. I found out that it’s important as well which option you choose on the RIGHT of the shape you choose (the triangle in this example). There are 4 icons and I chose the 3rd one (i don’t know the name, because I’ve got a Dutch version)… and that worked for me.

I can’t seem to delete the black background from the number nine image of paint toss without having to rasterize it first. It says, “…smart object is not directly editable.” But once it’s rasterized, I can’t fill it with the yellow paint anymore. 🙁 Help.

I am having troubles with the triangles as well. When i hit ctrl+enter, ctrl+J it creates a new layer and the triangle is no longer selected with the ‘marching ants’ and i cannot select it anymore so i’m not able to make both the triangles interlock, though i can move it around with the underlying image. Also When i create the triangles i have paths and intersect path areas selected i don’t know if this matters.

Hello,
tanks a lot for this awesome tutorial, but I’ve got one question. How have you selected the paint tossing, because when I only use the magic wand it’s not exact enough. So could you explain your method and way of making the selection?
Thank you very much 🙂

Lot of Photoshop tutorials I have read on photoshop paint splashing effec. I am really impressed to this tutorial. I just want to include one thing “Without excercise, practise and experience, the talent is of no use” and You did it. Thank you

Hey, cool photoshop tutorial. Just tried doing this of my own and because I use a Apple Mac, it would delete the paint splash 9’s background and I was wondering if you could back to me on how I can fix this problem. (P.S. It says this smart object can not be edited.)

On section 3 – face paint toss colour I get the following message when trying to use the magic wand “SMART OBJECT IS NOT DIRECTLY EDITABLE”. I found a fix for this online (rasterize the layer) but using that fix then seems to affect the colour and I definitely can’t use the brush tool to blend – I just get the original colour coming through. Can anyone help?